Cafardo On Soler, Gonzalez, Ibanez, Abreu, Kazmir

In today's column, Nick Cafardo of the Boston Globe looks at the Red Sox's shortstop position after the trade of Marco Scutaro. Major league evaluators are skeptical that Mike Aviles and Nick Punto can get the job done, which could leave the door open to prospect Jose Iglesias getting the nod. All eyes will be on manager Bobby Valentine to see how he handles the club's shortstop situation this spring. Here's more from Cafardo..

Two GMs told Cafardo that Jorge Soler will go for more than the five years and $15MM-$20MM most thought he would settle for. Some of the clubs who elected to stay away on Yoenis Cespedes because of the hefty price and question marks about his game have decided that Soler is a better value. The Red Sox are one of about eight teams in on Soler.

The Yankees prefer Raul Ibanez to Johnny Damon because of cost. Damon is seeking about $5MM while Ibanez will likely be in the $1.5MM-$2MM range.

Angels veteran Bobby Abreu would have gone back to the Yankees in an A.J. Burnett deal. The Halos have a logjam with Kendry Morales returning and Albert Pujols at first base and Abreu has been offered around.

The Red Sox didn’t attend Scott Kazmir’s workout on Friday and have no plans to watch Brandon Webb throw when he is on display. That's because Boston decided not to delve into the rehab market for pitchers. The club has tried a number of pitchers coming back from serious injury and in most cases, it hasn't worked out.

Cafardo wonders if Cardinals backup Tyler Greene is worth a look for the Red Sox shortstop mix. The 27-year-old was once a promising prospect and is out of options this year.

According to Baseball Reference, Johnny Damon has been worth at least
2.3 WAR, and the going rate for a win is about 5 million, so him taking a
5 million contract is an under payment. If you want to go with Fangraphs WAR, he was still worth 6.7 million. If I were a contending team, and I had to pick one of the remaining DHs, Id pick him.

Yea, I understand that, to be honest I havent paid attention to Damon rumors most of the offseason, so I dont know if it was him being stubborn, or teams just not wanting to spend 5 million on him. I know for a while it seemed like the Rays were going to take him, but that fell through.

I believe he was under the assumption the Rays would re-sign him after a pretty good year with them. We all know how that ended up and of course that narrowed down his suitors. Once the Yankees traded Montero my initial thought was a Damon reunion to help bring some life back into the clubhouse. With Burnett gone, that’s going to be a little bit of life gone from the clubhouse and I think Damon would have helped not only on the field but off. It’s unfortunate really…

What happened was, the rays were prepared to to offer him a contract a month an a half ago then backed out when they decided to go with luke scott, then the tigers were going to sign him for a year at like 6 or 7 million after Vmart got hurt, then they signed fielder. but alot of teams are starting to get away from boras’ players because no one wants to really deal with boras anymore. Yankees are one who have said they do not like dealing with him. Arod had him as an agent but changed agents last year. its going to hurt when cano becomes a free agent because he hired boras last year. and the way hes been hitting hes going to want to be the highest paid 2B in baseball.

Using WAR to determine someone’s actual worth is the worst thing to do. Simply based on the market, Damon is no where near being worth $5 mil. Just for comparative sake…

Miguel Cabrera (the highest rated player in WAR w/ more than 6 years experience) was good for 7.3 WAR, fan had him valued at $32.7 mil. He’s signed for $20 mil last year so his actual earning was about 61% of his perceived fangraph value. JD was worth 1.5 WAR, was valued at $6.7 mil and if he was paid $5 mil his real value would be about 75% of his fantasy value, which is much higher than comparison’s of much better players who are earning market value salaries.

Pretty sure the last SP rehab guy the sox had who ended up really solid was Sabes (Bret Saberhagen) and that was one of The Duke’s classic buy low moves.

As much as am a fan of Shaky Gonzalez.. Moving a good and dependable arm, like Uehara, for a guy just coming back from arm troubles does not seem like a wise move for any smart GM.. Could see picking him up for 1-2m tops, but he’s not worth the 3m Uehara is making on a guaranteed deal until he proves he is healthy again and after 2 seasons of woe with Baltimore and texas, Shaky has a LOT to prove IMO..

That might have been true under the francona ruleset where everything was set in a pecking order with veterans, or his buddies on the team came 1st and rookies had to prove their worth, or be pretty much be forced onto him by management.

Bobby V does not use that 1960-70’s and long out dated rule set. he will probably take a long look at how the other positions and bats stack up, then see if the kid has the chance to hit *some* this year and a legitimate chance to improve at the MLB level and not hurt him by doing so.

Where are the cubs fans clamoring for soler. I remember reading a few guys here saying it’s a done deal that soler signs with the cubs because they had a deal in place even though he is not allowed to sign. Yet the tribune is reporting that the whitesox are now the favorites to sign him.

In theory, nobody should be favorites because he is not a free agent. I think he is still officially a Cuban citizen which means it’s a violation of US law to hire him.
Once his paperwork comes thru in the D.R., MLB should declare him a free agent.
I’m guessing he has his unofficial, off the record, offers already in place.
With all the cost cutting going on with the White Sox, it seems unlikely they will outbid Philadelphia, the Yankees, Cubs, Toronto and Boston.